Aether is Unbreakable, Section 1
'Squad #REDACTED's Story (from Kari's perspective)' Entry 1 The first sortie went like something simple. At the time it was only myself and one Duke Brodacious Silver, a mountain folk reminiscent of “Ron Swanson” and with an affinity for the baritone saxophone. Mountain folk are constructs of scales or rock that are birthed through eggs and grow around magma or some sort of internal core element, they can live to be even millennia old. HQ informed the two of us of a counter-offensive group to the Guard by the alias of the “Breakaway Guard”. We met with a gunship (literally a gunner ship, not an aircraft) captain named Captain Scallion and embarked for a rubble-ridden old garrison besieged by these Breakaway. Upon arrival, these rebels had crashed a ship through the upper balcony and roof area of the structure which also left a breach in the fortress walls which the two of us utilized. Upon clearing the area, Scallion returned for us and we returned to HQ for a status update. Afterwards, we parted ways for the time being. I personally explored discreetly around the Aether. Entry 2 For our second sortie, Duke and I reconvened to meet with a new recruit to our squad. This one was an arachnomorph, top half human bottom half spider, by the name of Jeff. He is a bit more effort to describe. He wears a hat I had swear I’d seen on one “Jotaro Kujo” and wears a tank-top ridiculously tagged with “My Nama Jeff, My Joba Death” on the front. He would always travel with his companion and familiar, Randy. Randy was a skeleton that perfectly emulated Macho Man Randy Savage, a professional wrestler. Upon applying a better optic to my rifle, Randy took one for himself and foolishly applied it not even to a spade but a simple garden shovel. After this nonsense, HQ informed us of Breakaway activity on this plane where it exists only as a never-ending train nexus where homes are even built on the railcars. We hopped many trains and asked civilians of suspicious activity as proper officers would. One resident, a mountain folk woman, even invited us in for pancakes and sweets. I humbly declined whereas Jeff was purely ecstatic. As a token of his gratitude, he crafted a rather comfortable-looking sweater out of his spider silk for the woman. We continued our incursion afterwards and eventually found our way to the suspected hostile environment. We, although mostly I, cleared out the train with the exception of one hostage Duke took for questioning; afterwards finding many containers with proper stoichiometric blueprints detailing the contents as “Mutagen” and “Miasma” which were orange and purple gaseous vapors respectively. To our dismay we concluded the train we were on was to arrive at a warehouse in a different realm where the payload would be unloaded. Duke and Jeff advised we detonate the Mutagen within the warehouse in the realm, which the realm was called “Midnight City”. We abandoned the train with our hostage and they had me detonate the explosive payload affixed to the Mutagen. Entry 3 After our bout on the trains we patrolled around Midnight City for Breakaway involvement only to discover the Mutagen gas seeping our way at an alarming pace. As the gas overtook homes and businesses Duke had noted that this was mutating those it contacted into what were called “Chaos Elementals”. Clearly these things were dangerous, looking nothing more than monsters that glowed a compromising-like bright orange from their core. The four of us, our squad and this hostage who the other two would continuously refer to as Gary, ascended a vacant structure to its roof where we were met with a largely mutated chaos elemental of such Lovecraftian nature. This behemoth seemed to have been made with several inflicted fused to make a greater being. It attempted to bisect “Gary” but was warded by a spell casted on him by Duke which protected him enough to have bought time for an escape. An omnipotent being later identified as Roland motioned us into a portal and had us enter it by force, then closing it immediately after our entry. Entry 4 Once all accounted for, we continued our mission. Beginning with acquiring information forcefully from who I figured out was not named Gary, but instead named Geralt. He told us his boss was Black Fist, an enigmatic black knight, but wouldn’t tell us more. Searching our surroundings we could conclude that our location was known as the “Green Man’s realm”. The “Green Man” being a colossal Ent that wandered over the area. In front of us were more tracks to follow and another train to catch, but the last one we had seen was shortly after our entry and that would be the only one we’d see for around ten hours. Upon finding one, we entered it and found that the longer we’d travel for the more we had noticed this Miasma gas encroach on our railcar. Searching the train further we encountered a lone mountain folk in a leather overcoat like you’d see a cliché detective in noir-style of this decade wearing. Peculiarly, though, he kept using and writing in hot pink lipstick and then disappear. It felt reminiscent of what Katya had been doing to me for a time before my actual demise. Entry 5 Hours had passed even more so on that train, including a fight with monsters conjured from the Miasma, and we noticed the Green Man begin to emit this Miasma over the immediate area. Jeff reacted rather quickly and sealed the doors and windows for our car as we were about to pass in a thick cloud of this substance. Upon exiting it, we remained unscathed as the train for once ever came to a full halt. It stopped at a rather green town in this Green Man’s Realm that looked to have died out in an apocalypse several decades before us. All of its inhabitants remained as emaciated husks where they stood in their daily lives, a rather unnatural manner if it weren’t for outsider intervention. Reaching within the city hall for its archives detailed a signed pact with the Aether Guard, but its sigil was itself outdated even for the time it was enacted; concluding that this town met its fate by the Breakaway. Jeff managed to have fun having a mindless army of the town inhabitants at his side, even giving the mayor of the town a hat to wear under his control. I myself cracked the mayor’s safe and shared the wealth, it was the fairest thing to do. Upon leaving the town noticing the train headed for a different direction, I glanced back at the town only to notice a single crow glancing back. We peered at each other long enough for me to mutter the phrase, “This is my life, gunslinger”. Entry 6 After waiting some time on the train to return to base with our mission overdue complete, something interesting occurred. A new face with a peculiarly interesting varied choice of weapons appeared, cloaked but not enough to cover that he wore a Guard uniform. After a cease fire and rectification of a misunderstanding, we as a group knew this new face to be one Ping Keraser. He is an oceanid, specifically a manta ray oceanid. Oceanids are humanoid ocean aquatic life and are essentially exactly as the aquatic life are with the exception of being bipedal and can sustain in basic oxygen as well as the open sea. Ping notified his mission was from HQ in regards to our safe return as a new recruit. The guy had guile and while not the best with words, always wanted to be a showoff. While he flung his sidearm around I took it after him and showed him what it truly meant to be a gunslinger. It was then that started a playful rivalry of him trying to outdo me. Upon our return to HQ we were tasked to guard an Oracle with another squad who themselves seemed important like us. I remember their names clearly as I write this: Aharoni, Silver, Chase, and Sicrad. What I didn’t know until after the chaos was that one of them was the Oracle and was overall playing a disguise to lure out Black Fist who did indeed come to fight. The Oracle was sent out on a float in a jubilation of sorts for the Aether and we were to be prepared to fight. The scenario overall seemed nationalistic and militaristic but nothing I wasn’t used to. As it turned out, the event went terribly and Ping’s most prized (stolen) weapon was taken from him. This all occurred not without the vigilant overwatch of this lipstick mountain folk. Entry 7 The next time we reconvened for a mission we were sent out to a kind of demonic or godly entity that was a ship floating in the spacious, great beyond of the In-Between; the space that exists in the folds between realms. This entity was taken over by Breakaway and its location meant we needed the assistance of Captain Scallion once more. While Jeff waited for us to approach the vessel, Duke and Ping ran diversionary tactics in smaller craft around the ship while I used one of the archaic (although rather futuristic at the time) Browning M2 AT MGs to pick off rebels one by one, never missing a shot. Not particularly fair or moral, but when have I cared under this alias? Upon all of us boarding the ship, we attempted to breach security with disguises to get to the cockpit. This would prove to be a dastardly mistake as we were sorely outnumbered in that room once the CO of those rebels, a war priest, attempted to remove my mask. Our intervention stirred up the entire crew of rebels to converge on our location. While we were fighting them off very poorly, although I was the least hurt, Duke called upon his god as a Cleric, Ma’ax, for assistance. She answered, and Duke reigned down holy fire on everyone in ship which evidently made the entire structure crash so far out of circulation that only our squad remained as we awoke in the 7th layer of Hell. As we awoke, Duke lost his left arm and my mask was severely damaged. Someone found us shortly after we woke and we weren’t sure if this was a good or bad thing. Entry 8 We learned that the one who found us was named Joseph, a man surgically implanted into his own mechanical armor. He explained his entrapment in this area, the sandy and desert biome of the 7th layer of Hell. We then explained our situation to him, and he assisted us in both knowledge and shelter for the cold night ahead. In our shelter, Ping and I discovered its depths as the structure we took refuge in went several stories down into the ground as a structure in what appeared to be an abandoned city of stone. Jeff followed suit until all of us reached what appeared to be a final floor. On this floor there were many emaciated corpses in a thick tar-like substance that rotted away the bottoms of my shoes noticeably and hurt Jeff’s feet at that. One of the two made a damned foolish mistake as they all woke, but they didn’t immediately notice us. While one struck me in combat I was able to resist its apparent effects while Jeff was not so fortunate. While Joseph and Duke were able to remedy this later, at the time Jeff succumbed unintentionally to the effects of a magical affliction that would have ultimately mutated his dead body into something similar to these creatures. A legitimate ghast made its way from a seemingly never ending pit further down up to our level. After a formidable fight, Randy emerged victorious as it sent it asunder to its origin while beheading it with its spine attached as it plummeted. After that, Randy took it upon him to use this appendage as a new weapon. Entry 9 Joseph led us to a gateway to the next layer to progress our return to the Aether, effectively similar to Ysgramor. After managing to surpass a gatekeeper beast held back by Joseph ever so valiantly, we made our way to the next area. This area was much more like what most people of my origin would think of as Hell. It was compromised my magma, scorching hot, and the environment was made of an earthen dirt. Although it seemed more like a netherrealm, it was not arid and dry but instead intensely humid. For once, I had taken off my old attire down to show an unprofessional amount of skin to my colleagues and I was surprised to the lack of remarks about it, especially from Ping. Over time I had figured Ping to be someone lusting and the archetype of person that goes out often to find a quick hookup. Upon our meet with Joseph, Duke constructed a device that could accurately map out each layer of Hell given that we had the heart of a demon that resides on each layer. We finally utilized this device here just as Ping was able to finally channel a familiar of his own; a useless glitched crow named Roosevelt. Not only is it a bird, but it is useless. Upon walking for around two full days worth of time consistently, we came across the next layer in our travels. This layer was home to Adramelech, the rightful owner of Ping’s seized powerful sword. The layer was encompassed entirely by a thick fog that barely ceased to exist, all engulfing its surroundings which were a dense forest filled with monoliths and obelisks throughout. Upon finally resting we were surrounded by demons of the area whose sole focus was our extermination. Duke attempted a duel with one that looked particularly stronger than the rest, let alone speak our common language enough for us to understand. Notably I instantly terminated one of these demonic varmints with two solid rounds which was enough to almost get Ping killed as he attempted to outdo me. Duke must’ve accidentally broken the duel code and seemed rather prideful to eliminate this higher demon in solitude despite him eventually being the only remaining demon. In the end Duke alone took his heart and implanted it into our “Hell GPS”. Entry 10 We progressed further into Adramelech’s layer of hell to eventually find ourselves cornered against a cliff with the realm’s even greater demons approaching us menacingly. Our options grew slim and eventually we all simply jumped off into the blackened abyss below us. Free fall isn’t one to scare me, but doing so without a parachute would make anyone panic. Somehow the G-force of our fall was fast enough to cause, I assume, all of us to blackout ourselves. Once we awoke, we found ourselves in the midst of a ritual conducted by Adramelech and his inner circle, and upon finishing our conversation as a group we had all awoken back in the Aether safely. Many were surprised we’d ever return at all given that apparently we had been gone for over two months and were immediately given a week to do so as we please without interruption. While Jeff and Duke went off to seek upgrades in their armaments, I at the time had about enough of the asshole I’ve been forced to deal with and marched for the nearest bar or tavern. While Ping optimistically followed suit, I had forgotten the year was 1924 and Prohibition was ongoing as I’m not particularly extremely well versed in American history. Upon reaching the bar, the bartender gave a convoluted response nuancing us to use the restrooms. Ping and I went to our respective restrooms and found that by flushing the back toilets led us to a more upbeat scene upon our exit of the restroom. My mind was fixated on having a good time, so coercing the bartender to giving me the toughest drink available wasn’t difficult. Apparently the drink in question was a physically impossible 300 proof drink, meaning it was 150% alcohol. I can’t say I’d prepared myself for that and ended up flat out intoxicated. After that things get hazy the later the night went, but I do remember Ping seducing a human guy for a one night stand and thinking of a plan to get involved. I asked him how he’d even have intercourse with a human as an oceanid and he honestly answered. I then asked him if he’d show me how that works and he lit up instantly. After that, things might be difficult to explain. I woke up in the barracks we hold up in with both mine and his gear on simultaneously, somehow. Duke found me with a disappointed glance on his face as Ping came in nude down to the wire questioning the events of “last night”. At this point, something serious clicked in me enough to snap myself out of my hangover induced migraines; my colleagues now knew my true colors. My face, my resolution, and my nature. All revealed in due time, like she said, and unintentionally. After this, I submit for a uniform change of someone I closely admired in my travels and Duke and Ping realized Jeff had returned to the home of his childhood. Something also at that point was off about Ping, something new, and I wanted to use our newfound “cooperation” to find it out, all in due time as we set off to find Jeff. Upon heading to the train station to follow him Ping thought it'd be nice to openly slap my ass, upon how hard of a hit it was I'd be lying if I said I didn't audibly react and possibly blush under my mask. I found it hard to rest on that train ride, thoughts swimming in my head. Entry 11 We slept on the train ride over, and I had a dream, a premonition, about Katya. Possibly even from Katya. I had one in the netherrealm layer of Hell similar to this where Katya was warning me to leave these people I’ve admittedly come to know as my friends. Before I had much time to process the information together, we arrived at our destination. Jeff, being there with Randy, seemed rather distraught at his situation; in a manner that none of us would understand. What we could only understand was to mourn with him and that he found a personal vendetta in this Black Fist we encountered. We searched around his house for possible keepsakes and Jeff indeed found a safety deposit box. This made me reminisce of the times Katya made me do illegal acts under my alias, very illegal acts, for “the greater good”. Apparently his mother kept a keepsake of a black velvet cloak with her in that bank as I sat there analyzing the amount of guards and cameras there were habitually, and then hating myself for that. We as a squad traveled around town until we had been kicked out of a store. Not entirely useless of a gambit contrarily, as I had a knick-knack to keep myself busy with along with Ping now being able to have one-way communication with any of us through any provided frog he could find. At this time Ping and I were acting like idiots chasing around frogs in the swamp biome we held ourselves in as Jeff adorned the cloak and vanished. We don’t know what became of his solitary adventure but he returned claiming to be a reaper of Death himself. Later on we took the train back to the Aether and was intercepted by my apparent doppelgänger who had been tearing up my allies. That is until it rushed in my direction and cleanly tore off my right arm. Instead of going into shock or panic like I would’ve in my youthful days as a GSG-9 recruit, I did what I shifted over to doing instead over the years: go into a murderous rage. My wound was not bleeding profusely and instead was festering as a black substance and before I knew it, my arm was reattached. I used this newfound anger to charge at the clone and hook them with my scythe to bisect them. Although before I could, an angrier Duke barged into the train car and instantly pummeled the suspect in its place. After it being flattened it emerged forward as an older man in a lab coat and Ping immediately identified this being as “Azathoth”. This being then showed me what of Katya, and claimed its ownership on me now. This only made me angrier in my attempts to regain control over my own fucking life that I just wanted to live in peace. After all that I went to the bar station and got a drink for myself as Jeff, who as an arachnomorph really shouldn’t be drinking, was there with me. I broke a shot glass in my hand and told him, “That’s rough, buddy” and went back to sleep adjacent to Ping. Entry 12 Upon arriving back in the Aether, us as a squad figured we’d spend our time trying to revisit the kind mountain folk lady on the train nexus. Well, at least everyone else did, I merely complied. We did manage to relocate the residence of this individual but not in the shape we previously encountered it in. Breakaway guards had seized it as a weapons stronghold and not for that but for the Breakaway’s sake we eliminated them all. While enclosing on the front on the train, I found that more rebels existed along with an alarming new supply of Mutagen. I rendered a lone rebel unconscious and displayed firearms manically around his body to suggest a fight or to suggest an accident so I may make a great escape. The squad gave me a charge to apply to the Mutagen as I hatched a plan to apply it and get away discreetly. I hid in the firearms’ box but before I could use my diversion I was carted off into a rebel base that the train had stopped at. With the rest of the squad unable to do anything as they saw me and our Mutagen detonation plan carted away against their power the only thing they could do was stay on the train. Once the cart was placed in its location and noise around me ceased I took the box and used it as a diversion to locate the Mutagen, because surely it wouldn’t be in the same rooms as munitions would be. That would be catastrophically stupid. I made my way to the exit instead and failed my mission, but before I could make it to anywhere clear I was dubiously seen through in my disguise with the box. I found myself surrounded by several dozen rebels with firearms affixed on me. At this moment I thought it might be time I’d save myself with the last thing I wanted to introduce another realm with: my Stand. As I exclaimed the phrase, “Sweet Dreams, Stop Time!” I stopped time enough for me to escape, but instead of doing so smoothly Azathoth appeared before me and struck me down as time resumed prematurely. I must’ve been shot around several hundred times in an instant, but later I woke up perfectly fine physically. I found myself strapped on an operating table in a laboratory shown before the war priest from several months ago. He explained to me my status no longer as a human being and showed me what I had become with that black, warping substance that now made up my skin. I was electrocuted to the point where my skin went jet black to reveal that I was a wraith. Little did this shortsighted fool realize that he had set up my escape plan rather than discourage me. Entry 13 I had spent some time in that cell, but instead of wait like a damsel Ping must see me as I did what only me as Kari Frost would’ve done: take matters into my own fucking hands. I attempted to channel what make my skin warp and with such constitution I could willingly change my very appearance not just in form but in clothing and gear substantially in addition. Thus I concluded that I am a special case, a case of a wraith changeling. Later on many people walked in and out of the room I was in and I never spoke a word. But one woman, a human woman, walked in and spent a little too much time for her own well being in my room. I managed to change into her full appearance and somewhat channeled through her to telepathically remove me of my bonds. I properly subdued her and left her bound in my place instead. At this time Ping entered the room, somehow, and before he could subdue me I altered myself to my original form. While he was left trying to impress me with, “Oh you know, I’ve been doing things probably cooler than anything you’ve done recently". I left him with, “I sincerely doubt that”. With a quick exchange of words he re-equipped me with my confiscated gear and I shifted back to the woman on the operating table before us as we left the room together. As we exited, the war priest entered the room moments after we turned the corner at the end of the hall. Upon our exit of what appeared to be a monolithic structure where I concluded I was we could hear nothing but alarms blaring within. I discovered that where we were was a city or township that’s residents were solely Breakaway Guard and realized then how steep downhill things were headed. I changed my appearance instead to an older gentleman as we made our way cunningly to where Duke, Jeff, and Randy were supposedly waiting in the room where the Mutagen was stored. Upon our return, everyone was expectantly puzzled at my appearance and I promptly altered myself back to my common appearance. Jeff’s reaction actually made my playfully chuckle, but such a respite was brief as my previous combatants who had shot me into oblivion before had caught up to our plan and the warehouse room I remembered escaping from before was surrounded. It was then that I cursed myself not for the combat situation at hand but that where I had started my stealth mission was really the overall destination I had hoped to locate and internally I made a fool of myself. Entry 14 Only the Ent from before entered the room it seemed, so it could be that he was the only one who knew ultimately of who we were and our purpose here. This, or perhaps he simply saw me and my allies as perceived threats by affiliation to me. Either way, my unconventional allies took to fight first and questions later. Jeff did as much to raise a pillar and entrap him to the ceiling, that is until he fought his way out. It wasn’t an easy fight, in fact it wasn’t until Duke held his shield for Jeff and Jeff evidently killed the Ent upon him destroying Jeff’s stone-shield spell and shrapnel delivering the final blow. I took to my new abilities and effectively shifted into him as a disguise since I was not in a disguised uniform while Duke more or less punted the now dead Ent to a less visible location to prying eyes. As the Ent was the nearby CO I used that to order a lesser-rank rebel to detonate the clacker for our overall plan while we made an escape. I led all of us in our squad to the train station exit and found that the recruit really did follow my orders as us and the rebels around us all heard a disturbing, muffled detonation some distance away. Jeff had the intriguing thought that the explosion had sounded more amplified than we’d planned. I concluded aloud that I was stored in a box of munitions, and that there were many more like it thus contributing to the overall blast. Jeff apparently had a backup plan, but I was unsure if it was the goo monster that appeared before him or the obvious beast that flew to our aid. We along with supposedly just a wanton rebel Ping had been discussing with mounted the beast and flew rather incredibly hastily away from the disaster we had just caused. At this point I zoned out some, reflecting on us as a group and me as a contributor. What really was I meant to do here, and what did Katya, or otherwise Azathoth, need me in this plane of existence for? A sudden intense chill threw me back into reality as it were upon realizing we all had been dropped off in a random location of the Natural World. I also took to noticing why in the hell did we bring along this random rebel with us. Whatever brought me into the Aether Guard must be for an important reason, a reason that otherwise wouldn’t be significant enough to bother with, thus I had to uphold that unknown reason. I couldn’t have this rebel exposing my existence to his allies, and when someone needs silencing it needs an accurate shot. Ping put his hand on my rifle but I fired anyways, or so I thought as I was intercepted by Duke who had been a hairpin shy of outright killing me, even if my death is temporary. It was at the moment I awoke from unconsciousness that I saw these people less as who they were but what they signed up for. A snowstorm came before us and while I had found us shelter I also felt perplexed at why I simply didn’t leave these people to their own musings. I sat alone contemplating why these people even bothered to save me, despite that I knew I didn’t need their help. I’ve always worked alone, I’ve always been the only survivor, and I’ve always been used to that. They were talking to that rebel, but something he said set me off. I got up from where I sat and conversed with them sternly. Jeff said we were all friends, but I wasn’t sure. I still wasn’t sure what it meant for me, the last time I worked with a team I hated it and did all of the work anyways, and before that I enjoyed the company of who I worked with. It’s particularly why I worked solo operations until I eventually I, well, died. Eventually everyone went to sleep, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. Entry 15 We were evicted from the cave by its monstrous owner, and I honestly could not care the slightest. What I immediately noticed upon making sure we were all ready to depart was the lack of our resident pirate. Upon asking the others where he was, their responses seemed more of confusion than concern. Apparently no one knew of him and I was the only one with the memory of him. Great, another curse to bear. We embarked in frozen nothingness for hours, and if it weren’t for my inherent apathy I would have been worried with the frostbite I probably had developed. As a wraith, who’s to care if an undead creature turns black, wouldn’t that be normal? We came upon a mining town that let us in promptly and lost sight of our hostage promptly. Duke and I requested help as Jeff went along determining where we had ended up. I was honestly rather spaced out throughout our entire time there, all I could think about was how my life could become more suffering than it already was. At the end of the “day” we went on to an inn and rested. Other Cached Data Entry 8 Entry 11 Category:Bypassed Files Category:Significant Characters Category:Aether Realm